Girgashiy Raid Guide

Intro

Rewards

Basic Advice

Crusader Skills

Subskills

Girgashiy's Attacks

Support Roles

1 - Intro
Raids are when a squad of up to 16 players enter a special mission to to kill Girgashiy. Using teamwork and special skills earned from the completion of G19, players can disable and kill Girgashiy to earn training, experience, and rewards. Raids are started on the side of Bean Rua (the pub in Emain Macha) and use squads instead of parties.

Raids can be intimidating to approach, but in practice they're just a collection of simple mechanics. This guide is intended to show you how to complete raids in a basic manner, while also giving advice on more advanced techniques.

Don't panic.
Once you've seen his attacks and know how to react to them, it's a simple matter of making sure everybody reacts properly and does their role. Many of Girgashiy's attacks are %HP based and thus, on lower difficulties, cannot one-hit you. Most situations are recoverable as well.

Stick with the group.
Do not run away further than you need to. Shielders can only protect you if you're close, and running away from the boss will actually attract his attention because he lands on the furthest away player after a jump. If you're far away people can't easily/quickly free you from attacks, and it generally makes the rest of the party go through more trouble than they have to. Please just stick with the group.

Don't transform.
Unless you absolutely need to for Blade damage or to gain enough bonus HP to survive a sudden attack. Most of Girgashiy's attacks are %HP based, and so transforming for higher defensive properties and more HP only helps against Staff Swing. It can actually be detrimental because you take more HP damage from many attacks (since you have more total HP) and so there's more HP (and wound) damage you take that has to be recovered by whatever healing is available.

4 - Crusader Skills
Girgashiy is a gigantic monster who has incredible defenses and cannot be swayed or stunned through normal means. He is not invincible, however taking down Girgashiy requires teamwork. Three skills are involved, but they share a cooldown so a player can only handle one role at a time. I highly recommend you read the skill pages for these, as they include lots of additional info on the mechanics that I won't cover here. This includes things like the minimum number of shielded players needed per difficulty, and the minimum spiking level per difficulty.

- Shielder
The defender, using Shield of Trust. Your job is to recognize when Mineral Hail is coming in order to defend yourself and nearby party members against it. Subskills, once obtained and ranked up, will also grant your Shield healing and buffing properties.

Suggested Stats: Enough MP to last. The defensive properties are purely based on skill ranks.
Suggested Gear: Dowra SE, and whatever else for your support role.

- Spiker
The retaliation with Celestial Spike. After Girgashiy has been stunned by Mineral Hail being defended, the Spiker uses Celestial Spike on the Girgashiy when he lands. If the spiking is strong enough (and done soon enough), Girgashiy will fall to one knee and be stunned longer. In this state, it is most susceptible to the next skill.

Suggested Stats: The lockdown properties are based on skill ranks, but movement speed helps.
Suggested Gear: Dowra SE, and whatever else if also doing a support role.

- Blader
The attacker, using Judgment Blade. After Girgashiy has fallen to a knee (which can take a few seconds after being spiked), Bladers drop their blades on him, dealing proper damage. Subskills can add additional detrimental effects to Girgashiy, as well as greatly increasing the damage dealt with the attack.

Suggested Stats: As much STR as you can manage.
Suggested Gear: A red-upgraded lance with lots of piercing/damage, and Dowra SE. Bone Chips (Bone Dragons drop them on death) grant 20% extra physical damage for two minutes.

Originally Posted by ironwoman

For Elves that want to blade, Celtic Royal Crossbow with the Sharp Bolts and Bhafel Combo will do the trick as well. The arrows (the 10% and 15% additional damage) also give bonus to Judgement Blade, so your damage difference won't be a lot.

Generally the leader will ask who is going to be in which role, and the squad screen will be divided into 1/2/3 as Shield/Spike/Blade.

Squad Screen

It's important to make sure that there's enough Shielders to stun Girgashiy after Mineral Hail, and enough Spikers to bind him properly. The number required depends on difficulty and ranks respectively, and is detailed in the skill articles.

5 - Subskills
In the bottom-left of the Crusader skill tab, you can click Manage Skills to access the subskills menu. Here you can freely allocate points to your subskills. Some subskills are more useful than others for raids, and the number of points available to you depends on your Crusader Level. Only subskills determined to be useful to raids will be mentioned here.

Subskills

Shield of Trust
- Giving Heart: Lets you shield players from a further distance away. Pretty useful because players aren't always standing on top of a shielder, and Girgashiy likes to smack people around.

- Healing Hands: Restores up to 150 HP. Useful for recovering from various attacks to both you and the people you shield.

It is actually possible to get this skill using solo raids. You have to create the raid squad after pressing the solo raid dialogue option, after that it will let you enter into the raid while in a squad and count towards sub-skill training completion.

- Recovering Touch: Recovers a percent of wound on affected players. Very helpful.

Celestial Spike
- Spreading Faith: Increases the range at which you can use the skill. This makes it easier for a Spiker to affect Girgashiy if Girgashiy landed on a far-away player after a jump.

Judgment Blade
- Binding Needle: Increases the amount of time Girgashiy stays stunned by the previous Celestial Spike attack. Considered pretty important in groups, generally Bladers will be put into a "blade order" based on the rank of Binding Needle. This is because if the players with the highest ranks hit first, they increase the time left for more blades to hit Girgashiy.

- Breaking Lies: Permanently reduces Girgashiy's special defenses. Causes later attacks to deal more damage, actual degree of usefullness to be determined.

See here for detailed information on training subskills and leveling up.

6 - Girgashiy's Attacks
He has a variety of unique attacks which require players to react or respond in a specific way in order to prevent damage or retaliate. Luckily for you, once you know what to do it's very simple to respond.

Attack: Girgashiy... swings his staff. Hits everybody in an arc and knocks them back. Very basic, uses it constantly, the attack deals normal levels of damage but can be disruptive. It can knock you back pretty far from the group if you get hit a few times.
----------
Response: Avoidance. Stand underneath him, behind him, or far enough away from the arc of the attack and it won't hit you.

Attack: Girgashiy crouches down while strange black and yellow portals appear over everybody. After a few seconds, Girgashiy jumps, and a hail attack hits everybody in the squad. This attack deals a percent of your max health in damage, depending on the difficulty.
----------
Response: Shielders should use Shield of Trust as soon as they can. There's a small bit of leeway, but Shield's main effects lasts longer than the attack so it's best to fire it off the moment you see Girg take the pose (or the telltale clouds if you play zoomed out enough). This will reduce the damage dealt to shielded players (up to 100% reduction at rank 1) and will stun Girgashiy, allowing the Spike->Blade combo to damage him. If you're not a Shielder and not close enough, you can ride/hide inside a Mimic pet (yours or another player's), which will reduce the damage you take.

Attack: Girgashiy hits the ground with his staff, causing giant crystals to form over random party members. These crystals cancel skills and immobilize players, while dealing steady wound damage.
----------
Response: Attack the crystals. This is one place where Dual Guns are handy as they can rapidly free multiple players within shooting range. If you're in a crystal yourself, you could try summoning multiple pets with AoE effects to damage the crystal enough to free yourself.

Attack: Girgashiy thrusts his staff through the air, and random players will be affected. Players who are poisoned will have a purple ring around them, and will lose health over time.
----------
Response: Spread out. If you get within another player's ring, the poison effect will spread to you (and you can spread it to others if you move too close to them). Players can infect eachother back and forth rapidly, so if people are running around randomly it can easily make the poison last longer than needed. Circles can overlap without penalty, as long as a player is not within another player's circle the poison will wear off within a few seconds.

Attack: Girgashiy grabs a player and lifts them up, charging a huge attack. A green bar appears over his health bar, and if allowed to complete the attack Girgashiy will stab the grabbed player. This deals lots of damage, heavily wounds, and sends the grabbed player flying back a huge distance.
----------
Response: Attack Girgashiy as rapidly as you can. Also summon a pet and command it to attack Girgashiy as well. The green bar above Girgashiy's health is an attack bar, and the number on it is scaled to a multiple of the current squad size. Girgashiy needs to be attacked that number of times in order to drop the player he's holding. This move is one of the main reasons I recommend Dowra SEs, as guns they attack twice per normal attack and they have large magazines and potential for a long range. Make sure to desummon your pet if Girgashiy uses Mineral Hail afterwards, it's easiest to set a desummon hotkey and spam it in case of client lag.

Attack: Girgashiy grabs his staff with both hands and smoke begins pouring out of it. A purple health bar appears above his normal one, and clones of players spawn on top of the actual players. The clones will run towards Girgashiy, and if they reach him the associated player will immediately die, and Girgashiy will also restore some of his health.
----------
Response: Keep your distance from Girgashiy, and attack. The purple bar is the amount of incoming damage (before his special apostle defense) that needs to happen in order for the soul attack to cancel. You can use gun skills, archery, Lance Charge, or even Final Hit's teleportation to deal enough damage to Girgashiy before the souls reach him. Alternatively, attacking a soul will cause it to stop moving for a second or two, so you could attack the souls of you and nearby players to delay their death long enough for the attacks to deplete the purple bar.

7 - Support Roles
In addition to the three main roles, there's three support roles that can make the raid easier, and are generally included in squads.

- Buffing
Battlefield Overture helps a lot. Catering also helps, but is not used as often due to the hassle. Vivace is useful during Fanatacism (Grabs) for more rapid attacks from the party. Any role can be a buffer (since the effect is quick to trigger and lasts a long time), generally picked based on who gives the best bonuses.

- Party Heal
People are constantly taking damage, so Party Heal is a very useful skill, especially with any enhancements such as the master title. It's generally easiest for Shielders to also be the healers, since they're not doing anything after defending Mineral Hail while the rest of the players are scrambling over to Girgashiy. Shielders can use this time to heal/mend the group as needed, and can even start loading Party Heal when Mineral Hail is still coming down, as the Advanced Heavy Stander effect of Shield of Trust will allow Party Heal's loading to continue through the attack.

- Support Shot
Girgashiy will take more damage if he's under the effects of Support Shot, simply enough. Rank 5+ recommended for the firing speed (so you can fire it off for each Blader in turn), rank 1/master title of course recommended for the best buff to damage. Bohemian Wear set with 10 total points in Support Shot Enhancement will help as well.

- I know Girgashiy is supposed to be a race, but referring to the enemy as a singular he is easiest.

Hiding in a mimic can reduce the Girgashiy's jump attack significantly, and you'll see VHM groups do this to get maximum number of blades possible to do 30 sec runs.

Transformation can also be used as a way to survive in certain scenarios. For example, if you have less than half your HP and you're not getting shielded in normal, and you know that using transformation will boost your HP to at least 50%, then I'd go for it. Transformation also does make Girgashiy's jump attack do less % of the damage due to transformation's built in damage reduction.

Spinning Uppercut -> Rage Impact -> Support Shot for maximum blade damage. Also good idea to see who in the squad has the highest maximum damage with blades, as well as Christening Blades level, Breaking Lies level, and overall Smiting level as the person with the highest stat in the said criteria should be hitting the highest, which means faster run time as well as more defense reduction.

During Fanaticism, the main bard buffer should be using Vivace and people should have their pets out to attack the Girg. When it jumps up, desummon it so that it doesn't keep attacking and waste the support shot buff.

As for blader role, you don't have to be using a lance, and for Elves that want to blade, Celtic Royal Crossbow with the Sharp Bolts and Bhafel Combo will do the trick as well. The arrows (the 10% and 15% additional damage) also give bonus to Judgement Blade, so your damage difference won't be a lot. In fact, in some KR VHM runs, you can sometimes see Elves blading with Bhafel Combo and spamming Magnum Shot with campfire after it doesn't die after a full round of blades.

Also for Rewards you should include the VHM titles as well as the enchants for the said weapons.

- Added the suggested bit about transing for more emergency HP to the basic advice part. It's interesting to note that transing only gives you an untargetable property (which some special moves like Mineral Hail ignore), while activating Divine Link (the soul exchange phase) gives you a few seconds of invulnerability that actually stops Mineral Hail and more from hitting (haven't found anything that'll hurt you or the pet during that phase yet). It's not something you can whip out as quickly though due to needing to click on a summoned pet so I'm not sure if I should include it.

- Forgot about the mimic thing, was going to have a section about VHM but I haven't done the leading role there yet so I didn't include it. Added the mimic bit to the hail section.

- I mentioned pets for Fanatacism, but I'll add the bit about remembering to desummon them. Also added the Vivace part to the buffer thing.

- Added a bit about having enough shielders/spikers to the basic roles section.

Both lasting 10 seconds isn't the issue, it's how you fire Support Shot after Rage Impact. You know how Rage Impact's effect doesn't kick in right away? You need to use Support Shot right after Rage Impact is used before the mob turns red by the effect. That's about .5 sec to 1 sec window and people generally need practice for that.

-bohemian set for support shotters
-axe smash debuff
-bonechips and attack power pot
-shielders have easier time to time rage ss due to guarded footstep+spikers get locked in spike animation for quite a long time. This doesn't really matter outside of vhm and possibly hm.

Well this is mainly intended for existing players who are new to raids. I'm not going to list Pivotal Moments Rusty Longsword via Devil's Cry, for example.

I named Support Shot because it's not normally used/considered in random combat, but can be very useful here. Most of Mabinogi's meta right now revolves around rapid attacks from a single player. Raids, on the other hand, focus on long-charge single attacks from some players with others taking no action during that time. This brings up a time frame for party members to use buffs, and of the various buffs that can be applied Support Shot is one of the quickest/easiest... while also being the most potent at 170% to 200% damage dealt.

There's definitely other buffs, but my question is if they're worth it (% for effort).

- Bohemian's set effect, does it actually make the support shot buff stronger? Like is there evidence/tests of this? I know the reforge is actually the SS arrow damage and not the buff (and thus meh).

- Axe smash, does the -3 prot actually, like, tested legitly work on Girg? With actual numerical comparisons to show it's worth the effort? With some roles it's annoying enough already to change between sets of equipment.

- Bone Chips I straight-up forgot about.

- Guarded Footsteps needs 10 kills as lead (solo does not work) to unlock at level 1, so I didn't think to include it for a newbie guide, also not familiar enough with VHM to include tactics.

There's definitely other buffs, but my question is if they're worth it (% for effort).

- Bohemian's set effect, does it actually make the support shot buff stronger? Like is there evidence/tests of this? I know the reforge is actually the SS arrow damage and not the buff (and thus meh).

- Axe smash, does the -3 prot actually, like, tested legitly work on Girg? With actual numerical comparisons to show it's worth the effort? With some roles it's annoying enough already to change between sets of equipment.

- Bone Chips I straight-up forgot about.

- Guarded Footsteps needs 10 kills as lead (solo does not work) to unlock at level 1, so I didn't think to include it for a newbie guide, also not familiar enough with VHM to include tactics.

1. Yes

2. It works, but probably not really worth the effort.

3. Guarded footsteps should still be included, as even for newbies, it is something important to know about.